Posted!

Join the Conversation

Comments

Welcome to our new and improved comments, which are for subscribers only.
This is a test to see whether we can improve the experience for you.
You do not need a Facebook profile to participate.

You will need to register before adding a comment.
Typed comments will be lost if you are not logged in.

Please be polite.
It's OK to disagree with someone's ideas, but personal attacks, insults, threats, hate speech, advocating violence and other violations can result in a ban.
If you see comments in violation of our community guidelines, please report them.

US government plans to execute 5 prisoners: What to know about Indiana's penitentiary

Before the end of the year, the first federal death row executions in 16 years will take place at United States Penitentiary, Terre Haute.

On Thursday, the Department of Justice announced that an addendum to the Federal Execution Protocol has cleared the way for the United States government to resume capital punishment, and a single drug called pentobarbital will replace the three-drug cocktail used in previous federal executions.

His execution will be followed by two more in December, and another two in January. Federal authorities said that more executions will be scheduled in the future.

Here is what you should know about the penitentiary that will serve as the site for the historic executions.

The death chamber at the U.S. Penitentiary in Terre Haute Ind. shown in this April 1995 file photo.(Photo: Chuck Robinson/Associated Press)

Where is Terre Haute penitentiary?

United States Penitentiary, Terre Haute is located at 4700 Bureau Road South in

Terre Haute. The facility is in western Vigo County, near the Indiana/Illinois border, and about 152 miles north west of Louisville (or 77 miles west of Indianapolis).

It is one of two facilities that make up the city's Federal Correctional Complex. The other, Federal Correctional Institution, Terre Haute, is a medium-security facility with an adjacent minimum-security satellite camp.

Both facilities are managed by the Federal Bureau of Prisons and house only federal inmates.

How many inmates does the prison hold?

The high-security penitentiary has a listed total inmate population of 1,380.

How long has it been around?

The facility first opened in 1940. Its construction was funded $3 million grant from the U.S. Public Works Administration.

It was designated as the site for federal death sentences in July 1993, and a special confinement unit for death row prisoners was established in 1999.

When was the last execution?

The last execution in Terre Haute was when Louis Jones Jr. was put to death on March 18, 2003. He was 53.

Jones was convicted in 1995 for the sexual assault, kidnapping and murder of U.S. Army Private Tracie Joy McBride.

The only other two executions to take place at the facility after the establishment of the special confinement unit was Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh on June 11, 2001; and Juan Raul Garza who was convicted of three murders and multiple drug trafficking offenses.

Any other notable inmates?

Dylann Storm Roof, the white supremacist who killed nine people when he opened fire in a Charleston, South Carolina church in 2015, is being held in Terre Haute after being sentenced to death in 2017.